Monitoring Desk: Former Taliban leader and founder of Islamic State – Khorasan Province (Daesh) Qari Hekmat is reportedly killed in Jowzjan province of Afghanistan.
He formed Islamic State – Khorasan Province – known as ISKP in 2014 after leaving Taliban group, reports The Defense Post.
Afghan News Agency Pajhwok reported that Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid had confirmed the death of Qari Hekmat in an airstrike and said that the Taliban had nothing to do with his killing.
Afghan media outlet “TOLO news” reported that Hekmat and his bodyguard were killed in an Afghan air force airstrike in Moghol village, Darzab district on Thursday while unconfirmed reports suggest that Qari was killed in airstrike of NATO forces near Qurogh and Qashlaq villages.
Qari Hekmat was virtually ruling Jowzjan since two years and he was one of the most powerful warlords in northern Afghanistan. He reportedly defeated Afghan National Army and the Taliban from Darzab district between March and May 2017. Jowzjan province is located in the north of Afghanistan bordering neighboring Turkmenistan.
Qari Hekmat was son of Tohir Yaldashiv, the founder of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). Tohir Abduhalilovich Yoʻldoshev (Russian: Тахир Абдухалилович Юлдашев cofounded IMU with Juma Naghmani in August 1998 while reportedly living in tribal areas of Pakistan.
He was reportedly killed somewhere in Pakistan in August 2009 but his death was officially announced by his group in August 2010.
